Convictions
by ImpishTubist
Summary: At the end of the day, she was still his niece.


**Disclaimer:** I own nothing.

* * *

"I told you already, I don't know!"

"Yes," Lore drawled smoothly. "You _do _keep saying that."

He stood, picking at the cuff of his jacket. The human had bled on it; the stains were going to be impossible to remove.

"Then you believe me," the man said. He let out an audible breath, relaxing visibly as Lore moved away.

"You'd have told me by now if you knew anything; of that I am sure." Lore cracked open the door, which led from the cargo bay to the rest of the ship, and called, "Lal!"

The newly-activated android entered moments later, clad today in an ankle-length muted dress. She looked slightly discomfited; her eyes darted to the two human prisoners and then to Lore.

"Yes?" she said softly, but the tone was strained. She knew what he wanted her to do.

He handed her the weapon from his belt.

"Kill them."

She let the weapon fall to her side and, acutely aware she had an audience, turned so the prisoners could not see her face.

"Uncle," she said, lowering her voice to a range which humans would be unable to detect, "I cannot –"

"Yes, you can," Lore said firmly. "You have run the scenarios dozens of times. Your shooting can rival even my own, and you  
know it."

"This is different," Lal insisted. "Those scenarios were for self-defense training, in the event we are boarded or discovered –"

"Yes, yes," Lore said, waving her off. "But I can't have you hesitating on me when something like that happens – and it _will_ happen. You need to be able to kill organics without a second thought or else you have no business being on this ship." He paused for a moment, his lips twisting into an eerie smile. "Also, this amuses me."

Lal lifted her chin. "Need I remind you, Uncle, that you are the one who initially brought me here, and without my knowledge or consent?"

"And I can just as easily drop you off at Daystrom," Lore growled, the smile quickly dropping from his face.

"That is an empty threat."

"Don't be so sure."

One of the prisoners lunged suddenly, taking advantage of his captor's distraction. Lore snatched the weapon out of Lal's hand and fired. The human collapsed as the laser bore straight through his torso, severing his spinal cord and leaving behind a gaping hole.

Lore slapped the disruptor back into Lal's hand, his expression furious. "_That_ is what happens when you hesitate. You'd be severely damaged right now if I hadn't fired."

"But – "

"Turn off your ethical programming if need be, but _never_ hesitate," Lore snapped. "Even _I_ have ethical programming, but I have not become slave to it. It is a guideline, albeit a strong one, but certainly not a rule. Remember that." He nodded at the remaining captive. "Try again."

Lal gave a jerk of her head. "I cannot – "

"You can and you will," Lore hissed, moving to stand behind her. He leaned over her shoulder, his lips coming within millimeters of the shell of her ear. "We cannot let him go – he knows too much. And we certainly aren't keeping him on the ship like some – _pet_," he spat. "Now either you can kill him or I can, but that's the only outcome he can hope for. This is survival, not some stupid game."

Lal whimpered, turning her head away, and Lore cursed - not for the first time - her emotions. They had developed on their own, independent of her programming and without any instructions to support them. Lore had used what resources were available to him to stabilize her, but even now she was still prone to emotional breaks. He hoped she wouldn't start crying again; it had been happening often as of late and he could not deal with it.

Do it!" Lore hissed again. He clapped her upside the head; she started violently.

"Uncle, I -"

"_Dammit_, Lal!" he roared. "_Now!_"

She fired.

* * *

Lal retreated to her quarters not long after the bodies had been disposed of, complaining of a "constriction in my neural pathways."

"A headache," Lore said disbelievingly. He was lounging in the cockpit of his small vessel, feet propped up on the console while he skimmed through the contents of a PADD. Lal stood in the doorway, her fingers laced behind her back, the tiny lines that fanned out from the corner of her eyes the only indication that she was experiencing discomfort.

"Yes."

"I could fix that for you." He leaned over and pressed a button on the wall. A drawer materialized, containing a number of small instruments. Lal held up a hand.

"No. I would prefer to deal with it on my own." She walked from the room without waiting for him to respond.

* * *

Lore gave a perfunctory knock before entering the room that served as Lal's personal cabin. He had respected her wishes for 3.2 hours, longer than was usual for him, but the unease that had been nagging at the back of his mind finally became too much. For reasons that were yet unclear to him, he needed to ensure that the damage he had inflicted on Lal was not permanent.

She had inherited Data's artistic side but not his scientifically–minded one. Her tastes – ironic, which she had yet to realize because she still had trouble grasping that particular concept – ran towards weapons. They were an art form to her, delicate and graceful, and the walls of her room had been decorated with weapons picked up from the number of systems they had visited in the past several months. Lal tended to spend her time at the planetside markets, seeking and bartering while Lore tended to business.

Lal was sitting on the couch, pretending to read. It was a poor imitation; her eye movements were too rapid, even for an android, and she had been on the same page for far too long.

Lore pulled a chair up to the couch and took a seat in front of her, crossing an ankle over his knee and leaning back in his seat.

"Why the sudden behavior?" he asked finally, breaking the silence after three minutes.

"I am angry with you," Lal said without looking up from the PADD.

Lore snorted. "Lal, you spend your entire existence angry at me. No, that's not quite what's going on here."

"Why do you care?" she asked, setting aside the device.

"I am forced to rely on you, and I cannot afford to have you compromised. It could mean the end of both of us."

"You are forced to _rely _on me only because it was you who brought me on this vessel in the first place," she pointed out.

"And would you rather be back in your father's - in _Data's _- lab, deactivated and forced into an eternity of oblivion?" Lore snapped.

Lal was quiet for a moment. She looked at her hands, folded now tightly in her lap, and then back at him. "I have no wish to kill, Uncle."

He winced, as he always did when she referred to him by the familial title, though he had long ago given up on trying to dissuade her from using it.

"That much, my _dear_, is obvious," Lore said dryly, and he would have snorted again, but her expression stopped him, as though a physical barrier in his positronic net was holding back his reflexive reaction. The corners of her mouth tightened and her gaze flicked away from him, fixing instead on the floor at her feet.

He knew that look.

It was the expression of an android who had never had the love of the woman he was supposed to call _mother_. It was the expression of an android who had watched the one he called _brother _die before his eyes, as a year's worth of memories and growth were wiped, only to be replaced by logs and journals of people they barely knew.

It was the expression of an android whose father had deemed him _special _and then disassembled him in favor of another. It was the expression of an android whose sole ally had turned on him; who had ceased _believing _in him.

It was the expression of an android who had lost everything, and gained nothing.

"I can't guarantee you won't have to in the future and I won't apologize for what I did today. But –" He paused for several seconds; a lifetime and a half, for him. "– I can _try_ to minimize the likelihood of you having to commit homicide."

Lal's head snapped up in surprise.

"Perhaps you would be more suited to thievery; you are certainly less conspicuous than I," Lore continued. He paused a moment, and then said, "I would not turn you over to Daystrom."

"I know," Lal replied automatically.

Lore snorted. "No, you don't."

He dropped his ankle from his knee, planting both feet on the floor and resting his palms on his thighs. He brushed his thumbs against the fabric of his trousers - a nervous tic, and one that had been picked up from months spent out on the frontier, drifting among the organics on the far fringes of civilization. He had learned quickly the necessity of blending in, and in the months since had found it difficult to break out of those habits. It was as though once they had been ingrained in his programming, they could not be removed.

"No," Lal agreed quietly, breaking Lore from his musings. "No, I do not _know_. But I believe."

"Belief will get you nowhere." Lore got to his feet in one fluid motion and made to leave the room.

"It brought you here," Lal said to his retreating back. "Is that not correct? You would not - _we _would not - be here if not for your belief in me."

_Belief_. A confidence in the truth or existence of something not immediately susceptible to rigorous proof. An opinion. A conviction.

_Lal _.

"There are too few of us in the universe," Lore said softly, "and too many organics. My rescuing you was simply necessary to our continued existence."

He knew it was a lie even before the words left his lips, and likely Lal did as well. His rescue - his _liberation_ - of the one who called him _Uncle _was no more an act of charity than the Earth was flat. She was alone now, with her father - with _Data _- dead at the hands of the Remans.

She was adrift, without an anchor, as Lore had been when his father - when _Soong_ - had said in one breath that he was _fantastic _and killed him with the next. And Lore had not known, not until this day, that with every fiber of his existence, he _would _ensure Lal's continued survival; her continued... _happiness_.

He would be, for Lal, a better creator than Soong had ever been for him.

Lore turned to leave again.

"Uncle," Lal said suddenly. He paused on the threshold. "Thank you."

"For what?" Lore asked without turning.

"For my life."

And later, as Lore maneuvered them carefully through the Antari Nebula, Lal finally emerged from her cabin and joined him in the cockpit. Her presence was not unwelcome, he decided as he watched her from the corner of his eye, noting how the faint light from the console lit her face an eerie blue.

"Thank you," he said at length, the phrase foreign on his tongue. She turned interrogative eyes on him.

"For what, Uncle?"

Lore felt his mouth tug into an odd smile, genuine and melancholy all at once.

"For _mine_."


End file.
